Update: Shares are now down $2.73, or 7.6%, at $33.04, heading to the conference call.

Update 2: Oracle on the call, noting some economic “headwinds,” is forecasting Q4 revenue to be down 1% to up 4%, with hardware revenue down in a range of 13% to 23%, on a reported basis. EPS is seen in a range of 85 cents to 91 cents.

Those figures appear to be below a forecast for revenue to rise 4.6% this quarter.

Catz, and her colleague Mark Hurd, were asked about what one analyst characterized as “broad-based weakness” last quarter. Hurd said the company feels “great” about its strategy, and said “there’s always something going on in the world, we feel confident about our ability to execute through it.” Catz added that the company’s win rates are “excellent” around the world, and that there is “no new news about the economy. The economy has been as it is in Europe for awhile.” Catz added that sales “execution” is an issue, as “sales kind of flop over into Q4.”

Hurd pointed out that “unit count” for Oracle’s engineered systems was “excellent” by that the company saw an average selling price decline last quarter because of “conversion rates” to models of hardware across the product line.

CEO Larry Ellison said hardware was being affected this quarter by a transition to new architectures in its servers, the so-called “F5″ and “T5″ processor platforms. “We expect the turnaround really to begin in Q1, not in Q4, because we have this large introduction of new systems.”

“Next year will be a big growth year for all our engineered systems,” said Ellison.

So much for Oracle saying how easy it was going to be to turn the business around. And I love it how Larry says he doesn't care about unit volumes, and Hurd focuses on unit volumes...

Something tells me there are a few management changes upcoming in that division.

MARCH 20, 2013 10:16 P.M.

oracle's hardware sucks wrote:

Larry has been saying that their hardware would do better every quarter and every quarter it goes down by 20% or more.

Why Larry ever decided to get into hardware is a mystery to everyone. Oracle is a software company NOT a hardware company. Can't Larry see that hardware is a sucky business??? Just look at Dell. Dell will probably be bankrupt in a few years.

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Tech Trader Daily is a blog on technology investing written by Barron’s veteran Tiernan Ray. The blog provides news, analysis and original reporting on events important to investors in software, hardware, the Internet, telecommunications and related fields. Comments and tips can be sent to: techtraderdaily@barrons.com.